Until this week, finding work at Fort Drum was a bit of a mystery for James V. Watts, owner of a local landscaping and snow-removal company.
On Wednesday, Mr. Watts joined 65 other business owners at Jefferson Community College to learn how to tap into the lucrative market of government contracts.
The event, titled "Selling to the government — a day for opportunities," was sponsored by the Small Business Development Center and featured information sessions with U.S. Army Contracting Agency representatives. The day featured workshops by business experts from Fort Drum and the U.S. Department of Labor, among others.
Although the sessions tended to veer into a wilderness of acronyms and technical requirements, Mr. Watts said, they helped him find the Fort Drum contacts he needed.
"If you don't have people like this, you tend to run into brick walls," said Mr. Watts, the owner of 4 Elements in Watertown. "You've got to have some liaisons from Fort Drum, from the federal government, to open up these doors."
The event included speakers such as Annie L. Semo, deputy director of contracting at Fort Drum.
In fiscal year 2007, Fort Drum awarded $104.3 million in contracts. Much of that amount went to contracts in the immediate area, Mrs. Semo said, with $27.4 million going to local construction, $15.1 million to service and $984,160 to supply contracts.
Of the $14.7 million spent last year through the government credit cards, $10.5 went to north country businesses, Mrs. Semo said.
To tap into the services market, Mrs. Semo encouraged business owners to reach out to authorized government credit card users.
The Army Contracting Agency will not provide the names of those with cards, but will provide an address where business owners can send a letter of introduction, she said.
There are limits to card purchases — single transactions are restricted to $3,000 for supplies, $2,500 for services and $2,000 for construction — but Mrs. Semo said card holders will often return to local businesses that are familiar.
"You need to reach out to them because they don't know 90 percent of the time that you're existing," she said. "If you want to target that market, of credit cards for the base, you guys have to be the assertive one."
In a concurrent session, Joseph J. Williams Jr. offered tips to local owners on navigating the often muddy waters of government contracting.
Mr. Williams, program manager for the Cattaraugus County Procurement Technical Assistance Center, started by saying that federal, state and local governments issue $800 billion annually on contracts.
"There are opportunities out there, anything from $2,500 to a few million," he said.
Business owners can tap into such opportunities by working with the center and its large database of government contracts.
Mr. Williams said the center could help contractors understand labyrinthine regulations and find more bidding opportunities.
At the moment, the center's Rochester office is the closest location. A Watertown office, run by procurement assistance specialist Ashli F. Hayes, is expected to open at the Greater Watertown-North Country Chamber of Commerce by late April.
In the audience was Nicole J. Paratore, a marketing specialist for Timeless Frames, who wanted to learn ways to expand her company's sales to Fort Drum. She said the sessions provided her with a good entry point for information.
"We're looking at how to get more involved in selling to the government," she said. "It's definitely something we'll look into and see if it can provide any opportunities for us."
